Hi @rcanm, that's especially rough getting the diagnosis of esophageal cancer during the holiday. I'm taggin @dsh33782 (Don) to make sure he sees your questions.

Rcanm, what treatment plan has been suggested for you? Are you a candidate for surgery?

Hi @rcanm
I turn 79 this month. I had 28 chemo and radiation treatments. My tumor shrunk 40% after first 3 treatments. I was on a feeding tube for several months to get enough nurishment from ISOSOURCE canisters. I felt very tired during the treatment and had cough. But when the scan after treatment showed the tumor in my lower esophagus was gone, it was worth it. I did not have any esophageal surgery. Let me know if I can answer more questions?
Don

Hi there,

I was diagnosed last April when my husband and I were going to Montana to look at property to buy for our retirement. I swallowed my morning vitamins and couldn't keep them down. I went to the doctor, and I was diagnosed with dysphasia (difficulty swallowing...ya think!). Anyway, within two weeks I had lost 20 pounds and was in the emergency room getting a feeding tube placed because I couldn't eat or drink anything.

I am a 71-year-old female in excellent health (I don't drink or smoke) who may have contracted cancer because I am a stained glass artist and I work with toxic chemicals. Getting a cancer diagnosis is the scariest part of the process and I was lucky to have great support. I am an art teacher and have strong family-like support at my school. Having that support will really help you navigate the dark canyons of fear.

I went through 6 weeks of chemotherapy with Paclitaxel (Taxol, Onxal) and Carboplatin (Paraplatin) once a week and targeted daily radiation treatments 5 days a week. My cancer was located in the mid-esophagus right below the rib cage. It was a very fast-growing aggressive squamous cell carcinoma. I was told this was the best kind of cancer if you have to have it.

After a PET scan, it was determined that there was a still small residual area of active cancer, and my doctors recommended strongly that I get an esophagectomy surgery to remove the tumor. My cancer was still confined to the tumor with one suspicious lymph node. I really did not want to have the surgery because it is a difficult surgery right up there with open heart surgery. But it was clearly outlined to me that I would not live without it.

You must prepare for the possibility of surgery right now at the onset of your treatment because there is a lot of preparation and meeting with your potential surgeon before you can even be considered for surgery. Also, if you need surgery believe me you do not want to wait.
The main thing with cancer is to get your treatment going and if you do need surgery to not have to wait. The longer you wait the more cancer has a chance to grow. Also, after chemo and radiation, my tumor began to grow again and I was beginning to have difficulty swallowing again.

We learned that the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota was the very best place for this type of surgery because of the quality of doctors, the number of surgeries of this type done each year (over 300/ year) and the technological advances of the surgery (I had a robotic assist to during my surgery for my doctor to stitch me up). We had to take 3 trips to Rochester to get testing done to determine eligibility and counseling for surgery. Fortunately, I was healthy enough to qualify, and because I was still working I had really good insurance (Blue Cross of Idaho), and I was able to afford the travel. But do your homework, and be sure you find a hospital that does a lot of the type of surgery you need and check their success record. It will pay off in the end.

I was in surgery for 9 hours as they had to trim some of the scarring from my lungs due to the radiation treatment. Also, my trachea had fused to my esophagus and they needed to carefully cut the tumor away without damaging my trachea. I had the Ivor-Lewis procedure and recovery at St. Mary’s Hospital (also Mayo Clinic) was 8 days. The doctors at Mayo were incredible and I had one of the best thoracic doctors known today to do my surgery (Dr. Luis Tapias-Vargas). The hospital staff was amazing and my recovery was easy and pain-free. I loved that they brought in a masseuse to give me a back massage the day after my surgery, and they also did a sleep study on me before I went home to make sure I was getting enough oxygen. The nutritionist and the physical therapists were helpful and still kept in contact with me to check my progress.

I did have to learn how to eat again which was a four-week process before I could eat solid food normally again. The weirdest thing was after four months of not eating, I didn’t want to eat. It was not fun drinking broth and eating only yogurt, jello, or pudding. It took a while to get back in the groove to even wanting to eat, but it did happen. I eat better now than I ever ate before and I had a pretty good diet before.

The best news was when I returned to Mayo Clinic for my post-op PET scan it was determined that I am cancer-free. Yaay!!! Now my greatest challenge with my new-fangled eating system is to maintain my weight. I know it is hard for people to sympathize with someone who has to eat all the time (or try to anyway), but it is a challenge. I can maintain my weight, but haven’t figured out how to gain weight yet. The good news is that my surgery was on Oct. 4th last year and I have almost completely recovered. My normal high-energy level has returned and I feel great! I go back to work at the end of this month and I can hardly wait. There is life after cancer, and I know I would not be alive if this had happened to me thirty years ago. I am incredibly grateful!

That’s my story, and if you have any questions I am happy to answer them. I just want to give you hope as I was very scared at the onset of my diagnosis and I know there is potential for cure where in the past that was not the case. Thank God we live in the modern age.